Covington & Burling

Covington & Burling is a major legal and lobbying firm focused on "industry and regulatory" and "corporate, tax and benefits" issues, and litigation. They have U.S. offices in Washington D.C., New York City and San Francisco, and European offices in London and Brussels.

Stuart Eizenstat is a partner of Covington & Burling. 

Mad cows and toxic smoke
In April 2004, the Washington DC newspaper The Hill reported: "Creekstone Farms Quality Beef, which has been battling the U.S. Department of Agriculture to get permission to test its cattle for "mad cow" disease, has hired Covington & Burling to help it make its case." At the time, Creekstone was one of two U.S. beef producers who were seeking to resume exports to Japan, South Korea and other countries by testing every head of cattle they processed for mad cow disease.

According to a September 2003 press release from the firm, Covington & Burling successfully argued on behalf of the Southern Peru Copper Corporation to drop a lawsuit brought against it under the Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA) by Peruvian citizens charging the copper company with polluting communities and causing health problems. ATCA has been used to address serious human rights violations in places like Burma and East Timor. In their release, Covington & Burling decried the "aggressive, expansionist plaintiffs' litigation" under ATCA.

Tobacco industry
Covington & Burling also served as "corporate affairs consultants" to the Philip Morris group of companies, according to a 1993 internal budget review document which indicated the firm was paid $280,000 to "serve as general counsel to the Consumer Products Company Tort Coalition, agree the legal objectives with member company litigators, draft legislation and amendments, prepare lobby papers and testimony for legislative committees and administer the coalition's budget". 

Covington & Burling was involved in organizing Philip Morris' Whitecoat Project, designed to help obscure the health effects of exposure to secondhand tobacco smoke.

During the $280 billion U.S. federal lawsuit against Big Tobacco, Covington & Burling partner John Rupp, a former lawyer with the industry-funded Tobacco Institute, testified that "the industry sought out scientists and paid them to make an 'objective appraisal' of whether secondhand smoke was harmful to non-smokers, a move they hoped would dispel the 'extreme views' of some anti-smoking activists." He said "the scientists, who came from prestigious institutions such as Georgetown University and the University of Massachusetts, did not consider themselves to be working 'on behalf' of cigarette makers even though they were being paid by the industry." Rupp said, "We were paying them to share their views in forums where they would be usefully presented," according to Reuters. 

Partners in Covington & Burling include, but are not limited to, Keith Teel, Allan Topol and John Rupp, who have knowledge of lobbying tactics employed in Texas by the tobacco industry. The "push poll" conducted January 20-25, 1996, regarding Attorney General Dan Morales, was commissioned by Covington & Burling, and funded by Brown & Williamson, Lorillard, Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. Teel was a member of the tobacco industry delegation who met with Attorney General Dan Morales in February, 1996 in an attempt to prevent the filing of the state's lawsuit against the tobacco industry to recoup Medicaid costs for treating sick smokers. Teel has knowledge of the tobacco industry's tactics employed in Texas, including the use of "push polls" to intimidate or control public officials' actions.

Allan Topol of C&B attended a meeting of the Research Directors of Brown & Williamson, Philip Morris, and Liggett & Myers at Liggett & Myers Operations Center in Durham, NC on May 24, 1968. The objective of the meeting was to determine the variation and the amounts of Federal Trace Commission (FTC)-determined tar exposure which various groups of the population encounter when smoking various cigarettes. He attended the December 7, 1967, meeting at the Research Triangle Institute regarding individual's smoke exposure. He has knowledge of smokers' "compensation" techniques and the inaccuracies of the FTC method for measuring tar/nicotine exposure to smokers. Mr. Topol has knowledge regarding nicotine addiction, nicotine manipulation and disease/cancer causation. Covington & Burling were Counsel to the Tobacco Institute and Lorillard Counsel for Tobacco Sales. (PMI's Introduction to Privileged Log and Glossary of Names, Estate of Burl Butler v. PMI, et al, April 19, 1996)

TXU deal: 12 lobbyists per congressman
"Almost a dozen lobbyists registered last week to represent the investor groups involved in the $45 billion buyout of Texas electric utility TXU Corp.," reported The Hill in March 2007. Apparently the lobbyist hires were prompted in part by Representative Joe Barton's (R-Texas) criticism of the TXU buyout as "a bad deal for consumers." 

"The private equity groups involved, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR) and Texas Pacific Group (registered under TPG Capital LP), hired an experienced, bipartisan lobbying team from Covington & Burling LLP to keep an eye on Barton as well as those federal agencies that might need to sign off on the deal," added The Hill. 

Other clients

 * Compete, a coalition of companies "promoting competitive electricity markets." The group, whose members include PPL Corp. and DPL Inc., paid the firm "$200,000 to lobby the federal government in the first half of 2007," reported AP.
 * Sepracor, which "is seeking to fight a decision by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to lower the reimbursement rate for its asthma drug Xopenex," according to Boston Business Journal.

Contact information
1201 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20004-2401 Phone: 202.662.6000 Fax: 202.662.6291 Web: http://www.cov.com/index.html

Noël Decker Head of PR - U.S. Covington & Burling 202.662.6361 Email: ndecker AT cov.com

SourceWatch Resources

 * lobbying firms
 * Mad cow disease
 * Thomas O. Barnett
 * Antonio Miguel
 * Tobacco Institute
 * TXU
 * Whitecoat Project
 * Latin American ETS Consultants Program (ETS stands for Environmental Tobacco Smoke)
 * Patrick S. Davies